Paul was really specific about what to do before I start. That moment of silence that deepens right before you play? Use that moment to collect yourself, Paul said. The room — the thin audience clustered in twos and threes — waits for me. The sharp sound of paper programs cuts through the air. I raise my hands.
It’s a strange piano. There’s no time to get to know it. Some keys are heavier under my fingers than others — the looser ones give in so easily, it surprises me the way it does when you’re walking on a gravel path and the ground suddenly gives way beneath your feet and you slip a little — a turbulence that comes into the melody, shakes it off course. In a moment of panic, I think, for some reason, about my father, as if he could rescue me by discovering me playing by myself and put me on his lap, like a throne.
It starts to go lickety-split. Too quick, maybe. Not as emotional as I play when I’m alone, but fear is at my back, chasing me on. Paul would say I’m playing like I was admiring someone’s children.
People clap — no more or less than for other people. I rush off the stage, suddenly thrilled. No mistakes. A few sparks, even. I didn’t disgrace myself.
Now that I’ve finished, it’s easier to listen to the rest of the players. The next girl — the one with the gum — has marvelous fingers but no power — hers is the quietest piano. Next is a boy, flashy in his white suit, who makes a Liszt étude sound bizarre. There’s no music in his music. As I listen to him, it slowly dawns on me that I have a chance of winning. Why did I think this competition would be any different from the one I had done before? Was it because Paul gave me the name of it? I try to corral my expectations — it’s better, my mother would say, not to hope too hard, but it frolics in me like a puppy anyway.
Hours later, in the dark below the stage, I slip the backs of my heels off, swing my feet. My shoes have grown too tight over the course of the day, and I’m tired of wearing this dress.
Winners are being announced for the younger divisions, and I try desperately not to be jealous of the beruffled girls and boxy-suited boys claiming their prizes. They seemed like normal enough people before, but now I am curious about them, as if they all have some glow of destiny. I examine their shoes, their outfits, and try to correlate their winning with their bodies, but nothing about them seems special, except that they won.
“In third place, Jeffrey Chang.” My division. We sit up. A group of twenty or so stand up and applaud loudly. I swivel my head to see Jeffrey freeing himself from the audience, smiling as if he knew he would place all along.
“And in second place . . .”
I hold my breath, straining to hear my name and trying not to look like I want it as badly as I do. I glimpse the shame of losing. How would my mom handle it if I fail? She’s never seen me fail before. Maybe this would be the end of lessons.
“Claire Alalay.”
My mother yelps like she’s been pricked with a pin. They’ve slaughtered my name, a minor bruise to the ego; it doesn’t matter. I wobble up there, hands trembling as I take my ribbon and an envelope. The big meaty paw of a strange man in a nice suit is placed in front of me. I shake it and charge back, ribbon in hand, feeling like I could be four again, playing airplane, zooming up the aisle. I squeeze through the bodies in the row who can’t seem to help smiling at me, and I can’t help smiling at them.
“Ang galing!” my mother says, not bothering to whisper. I hand her the envelope. Three hundred dollars. My mother’s soft, round face has melted into happiness. “God is merciful.”
There is a quiet joy shining in my chest.
In the background, I hear Julia’s name called. First place.
“Yes! Yes, yes, yes!” I bang my palms on the dashboard with every yes. A weight in my body has lifted; happiness comes in bursts, like a piece of toast popping. Two competitions to place on my applications. I yank my body against the seat belt.
“Sst! That’s not very ladylike.” Then, “Are you going to keep the money for college?”
“I want to pay you back for the lessons.”
“No.” Her voice is stern. A tiny seam of worry appears between her brows again. “You have to save it for college.”
We stop at a drive-through and order burgers and fries.
“Why don’t you put a napkin on your lap,” she says, “so as not to mess up your dress?” I’m too happy to mind. There is a tiny whisper in my body: you really can do this. You could live the rest of your life working with music.
Stanford. Oberlin.
My mother drives with one hand, shoes kicked off. Eventually she hands me the wrapper that once held her burger. “When is the next one?”
She’s planning. It’s a good sign. I stuff the wrapper back in the bag, then dig down into the corners for stray fries. “In a couple of months.”
“That’s good. Two months before your next stomach flu.” I jostle her, and she smiles.
I flip through the radio stations. Everything is just too calm. I settle on the Beach Boys. Their music feels like sunshine. By the time we left the competition, it was dark out, so I never saw the sun today. Their harmonies swirl around the car, into my eyes. My mother sings along. That’s so rare. I fall into their perfectly harmonious rosy world along with her, thinking it’s mine.
“Well done,” Paul says later that week when I give him the news. He seems cool about it, but I know him well enough now to notice a glint of pleasure in his eyes.
I wonder if I should bring up our agreement, our trial period, then decide against it. He hasn’t said anything about it since that first lesson, and I begin to wonder if that means I passed. “I really don’t think I was that good.”
“It might be better for you to think that. Perfectionists make better art.” He walks to the bookshelves and plucks a slim, melon-colored booklet off a high shelf. “Here we are.”
Chopin’s Ballade no. 1 in G Minor.
It’s one of the most beautiful, strange pieces in the world. I give Paul a look.
“Perhaps it could be a — I don’t know — a set piece for you. For the Lener. It’s a stunner when it’s done right.”
“The Lener?”
“Oh, it’s ages away, but it’s this competition in the fall. I think you should try to go.” He looks around his desk, his glasses slipping on his narrow nose, and hands me a brochure.
On the front, gunmetal clouds and scrub brush. A building made of glass dwarfed by immense moss-brown mountains. First place for my age division gets five grand.
The fall? I guess that means I’m in. I’ve passed his test.
“Where is this place?”
“In Bishop. Near the Sierras. Very beautiful there.”
I try to hand it back to him, but he tells me to keep it, so I do, trying not to get it wrinkled in the jumble of my bag, and then I awkwardly get out my own copy of the Chopin.
“Ah. You have the Cortot. Perhaps you should have the Mikuli edition, too? Just for reference.”
He sits down on the wooden chair, pulling it up to sit beside me. I can smell him — soap, a faint woodsy smell. The notes swim before me, bobbing on their lines like fish in the waves. Sharps everywhere. The staffs jagged like mountains.